This wasn’t a path I wanted to go down. “You and Jeremy are the experts when it comes to this book stuff. You know your story better than anyone, and you know what would do it justice.”

  “What would it take to get you welding again?” Sonya’s question came out of nowhere, smacked me in the chest, and reminded me of the voicemail I needed to delete.

  “Clients who trust me. My contractor license restored.”

  “What if you had a client who trusted you and who wasn’t worried about your license because what she wanted wasn’t an I need a license kind of thing, and she knew you weren’t the reason you lost it anyway?”

  Sonya’s use of pronouns instead of her name didn’t fool me, and I wasn’t interested in her pity or charity. “Who?”

  “Megan.”

  Jeremy looked as surprised as I was.

  “For what?” I asked.

  “Okay, so it’s for her, but really I’d be the one hiring you, but it’s for her.” Sonya said quickly.

  Yup. There it was.

  “It’s a legitimate job, I swear to you.” Sonya was still going. “She found this perfect arbor for her wedding, but it’s way expensive. Like, it would cost her as much as the rest of the wedding. I’d love to get one for her as an early gift, and also ’cause—you know—Maid of Honor, but there has to be an alternative.”

  Jeremy stared blankly at her for a moment. “Fuck me.”

  “Later, if you want.” My retort slipped out without thought.

  Sonya’s soft smile was worth it.

  “Is this what the other day was about?” Jeremy asked.

  Sonya’s expression shifted in an instant. “No. I told you, I need more time for that.”

  “But you were asking about—”

  “Nothing.” Sonya cut him off. “Look. Megan sent me pictures.” She scrolled through her phone and showed me the image.

  The frame was wrought iron that looked like woven vines, like plants frozen in time. It had an elegant, elven feel, like something straight out of a fantasy movie.

  “That’s a really cool idea.” I had to admit.

  “Could you do something like that?” Sonya asked.

  I took the phone from her to get a closer look at the screen and examined the different angles. I’d played with sculpting a bit, for fun. “Maybe.” It looked like an amazing challenge. “Probably.”

  “This is exactly what the other day was about.” Jeremy was really hung up on that. “You didn’t want an in-game quest; you wanted help figuring out…” He snapped his jaw shut.

  Sonya winced.

  The idea looked like fun, but I didn’t have the equipment, and I definitely wasn’t interested in their schemes or their pity. “I’ll think about it.” I wanted to go back to the other subject before I lost my cool over this contrived conversation. “Are you really considering ditching the sex part of your book?”

  “I don’t want to.” Sonya puffed out her cheeks, and they deflated when she sighed. “You’re right that it’s at the core of her arc.”

  “You know which part has always been one of my favorites?” Thinking about it sent heat racing through me and was a welcome distraction. “Second book, when they finally reach that middle ground of understanding. When the sex is rough but the emotional pain is starting to bleed away.”

  “One of my favorite parts too,” Jeremy agreed.

  Fuck. I wouldn’t mind reenacting it now—an actual nooner. I’d love if playing out the scene from her book didn’t have any of the same heart and soul ripped out elements, but at least in real life, we hadn’t done that to each other. Our scars came from other people, like the man whose message was on my phone, taunting me.

  Nope. Wasn’t thinking about that. I was picturing bringing that intense, rough, sexy scene in her book to life. “You have to keep that.”

  “What did you like best about it?” Sonya watched me, bottom lip caught between her teeth.

  I stalled. Words weren’t my thing, even though I knew what I wanted to say.

  “Your heroine has been disappointed so many times in her life, been beaten down, that she expects it.” Jeremy had the perfect words for what I was thinking. “But her guys are there for her now, helping her through the trauma from her past. She trusts them enough that she’s given them the power to do what they want to her.”

  As he talked, I couldn’t help but draw a thumb along Sonya’s bottom lip, recreating the same mood we were discussing from the book. A quiet power that enveloped the characters that I wanted wrapped around us.

  Sonya gasped at the light touch and parted her lips. “And?” Her question was breathy.

  “She’s been with them long enough she trusts them with both the pleasure and the pain,” Jeremy said. “And both are part of her healing.”

  I pressed two fingers into her mouth and she drew them in, sucking hungrily. Need scorched me from the inside out when her eyelids fluttered.

  Jeremy watched us with an intense gaze. “She’s learned that she has the ultimate control.” His voice was husky. “She can stop them at any time.” He shoved her shirt up, exposing her. “And she trusts them to listen.”

  Fuck he was good.

  He hovered his mouth near her ear. “Which is exactly why she can let them keep going.”

  I dropped my hand to the button on her jeans. “Will you do that? Give me—us—permission to do whatever we want to you?” I undid the clothing.

  “Yes.” Sonya’s voice was sweet and yielding. “You have my permission to use me however you want.”

  Perfect. In a single motion, I lifted her to bend her over my knee, and yanked her jeans down enough to expose her ass. Her squeal of surprise took me from half-erect to full-on rebar.

  I slipped my fingers along the inside leg of her panties, then yanked up, wedging the cotton between her butt cheeks. Working the fabric, I teased and made sure it rubbed along her slit until she was squirming and sighing.

  When I slapped one cheek, she groaned.

  So delicious. Especially with Jeremy setting back on the couch and stroking the outline of a hard-on through his trousers.

  I spanked her again and again, alternating cheeks until her ass was almost glowing read and she was half-panting, half-whimpering. Jeremy’s breathing was almost as shallow as Sonya’s, and I was hard enough to fuck a hole through a wood board.

  If I were carrying my knife, I’d be tempted to slide the flat side of the cold steel along her skin and cut her panties off. I settled for something gentler and less destructive, sliding the lingerie down her legs and stripping her bare from the waist down. I smoothed my hand along the curve of her behind, being gentle with her tender skin, and slipped two fingers inside her.

  “I bet her pussy is dripping wet.” Jeremy said in a growl.

  I did like the way he had with words, especially the crude ones. “Like a faucet.”

  “God I like watching you fuck two together. Your fingers inside her. Your cock…”

  I was pretty fond of it as well. I teased Sonya, pumping in and out in a slow rhythm, until she was clenching and grinding against my hand. Her sigh when I withdrew was intoxicating.

  I pressed my fingers to Jeremy’s lips this time and he sucked me clean while Sonya lay across my legs, exposed and watching us intently.

  This was fun, but it was time for more. “Clothes off, both of you.” I helped Sonya stand and watched them both as I stripped out of my own clothing. Seeing them bare and exposed was stunning.

  If they were both a part of this, I was going to taste them both. I gripped the back of Jeremy’s neck, and Sonya’s gasp of delight was almost as loud as his groan. I crushed my mouth to his, and slipped my fingers between her legs, tasting his kisses and teasing her pussy.

  I needed more. I needed to leave my past behind. Feel Sonya wrapped around my cock again and lose myself in her and Jeremy’s bodies and minds.

  13

  Sonya

  I’d never lived anything like this. The intensity of the touches. The shared looks. The primal grunts and the atmosphere of desperate desire. It was like one of my books, but so much better because I was in the middle of it.

  How fucking incredible was that?

  Quentin faced me, his hands on my hips, and guided me with him as he stepped back to the couch. As he sat, he coaxed me to straddle his legs. He teased the head of his cock along my slit, but the sound rumbling from him said I wasn’t the only one enjoying the sensation.

  I gripped his shaft, taking control, and bumped my clit with his dick. It was meant to be a way to torture him, but it felt so good, and I was so close to orgasm. The longer I stroked him, the faster and harder I pressed him into me, using him as a human sex toy.

  He gripped my thighs, digging his fingers in. Goddess I wanted him to mark me in so many ways.

  I lost myself in the sensation, using his cock to tease my clit. Pumping and grinding as climax built inside me. Falling into the pleasure as orgasm washed over me.

  When I finally slowed to a stop and opened my eyes, Quentin was watching me with a wild, terrifying look. He gripped my chin. “After that, I need to fuck you.”

  I rose as I scooted forward, and guided him inside me. The way he stretched me out sent anticipation humming through me. We rocked against each other in a slow motion that tantalized without doing more.

  Jeremy brushed my hair from my neck and kissed up my shoulder to my earlobe. He nibbled the tender flesh. “Move so you’re both sideways on the couch.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because I want my cock inside your tight, slick pussy at the same time as Quentin’s.”

  Quentin groaned. “Fuuuuck.”

  His sliding out of me was a bittersweet blend of disappointment, and anticipation for what came next. He positioned himself sideways on the couch, and pulled my chest to his when he penetrated me again.

  I was still slick and ready from the spanking and teasing. Jeremy slid his fingers inside me, next to Quentin’s dick.

  Wow, that was differently delicious.

  “Relax.” Jeremy’s voice was soft but commanding as he stretched my opening a little bit at a time. It was uncomfortable, but it felt incredible at the same time.

  The intensity of the sensation was almost too much when Jeremy slid his cock inside me, nestled against Quentin. But knowing they rested against each other, pressed against my inner walls, made me slick all over again.

  They rocked together in a slow build of friction. Jeremy worked his hand between us to find my clit. I was so turned on by the newness of this—the incredible blend of everything—it didn’t take much to coax me toward orgasm again.

  Clenching around them when I came was its own kind of ache and delight. It was almost too much, but at the same time I tumbled past the edge of uncomfortable and into the drawn-out intensity of a third climax.

  Their groans mingled with my gasps. Quentin grunted and Jeremy panted and I had no idea which of them came first, but I swore I felt them spilling inside me.

  Jeremy collapsed on me, sandwiching me between him and Quentin, while we caught our breath. Jeremy slid out of me first, and it was like being popped or deflated, in the best possible way.

  Quentin withdrew from me as well, and pulled me into his lap as he sat. Jeremy settled beside us on the couch, and moved my legs to rest on his.

  I wasn’t the woman who got the guy. Especially not two of them. And I definitely wasn’t the woman who broke the rules, like no hooking up with your co-workers. But here I was, sitting naked in my living room, wrapped up with two gorgeous men—my roommate and my co-worker.

  Should I feel guilty? Not about what I did, but whom, and the fact that I wanted more when I wasn’t part of the long-term plan.

  I’d save guilt for later. I was basking now.

  Jeremy pulled the crocheted throw from the back of the couch and draped it over all of us. “Now we don’t have to go anywhere for a while.”

  Brilliant man.

  “Let me see if I understand how this works,” Quentin said.

  I was missing a point of reference. “The blanket?”

  Jeremy tugged one edge tighter. “If you make sure you’re covered, it helps keep you warm and lets you ignore that you have no idea where half of your clothes landed.”

  “Smart asses. Both of you.” Quentin laughed. “I meant this Rule 34 thing. If I wanted to play, I could say Aliens. The movie, not the History Channel guy.”

  “Too easy.” Jeremy shook his head. “You’ve got androids, tentacles, and space suits. It’s already practically porn without any work at all.”

  Quentin winced. “I do not want to know what’s on your hard drive.”

  “Are you sure? You never know if you like it until you try it.” Jeremy winked at Quentin.

  They were so adorable when they flirted with each other.

  Quentin turned to me. “Are you a tentacle girl?”

  A question I’d put far more thought into over the years than most people would admit, especially since my boss—my mentor—at Rinslet was a woman with a tentacle fetish. “I don’t see what the tentacles get out of it, but all those appendages working to get me off? There’s an appeal in that. Besides, a Queen is female, so she probably has a good idea what a woman likes.”

  “I’m so very disturbed right now.” Quentin’s heavy sigh was exaggerated, but he snuggled closer to us. “But also far more curious than I should tell you.”

  “See?” Jeremy sounded smug.

  “No. I don’t see at all. Not that I’m owning up to, anyway. What about…” Quentin stalled.

  I could almost hear the wheels turning, because this same trap had caught me before. “Is there a problem?” I asked.

  “This is a lot harder when I realize how fucked up the two of you are.”

  I grinned. “That used to trip me up, too, but I accepted my fucked-upness and rolled with it.”

  “Isn’t it brilliant?” Jeremy trailed a finger lazily along my skin.

  Quentin shrugged. “It’s kind of hot, to be honest.”

  He and Jeremy were definitely flirting. A giddy bubble grew inside me at the thought of them as a cute, filthy couple. If I pushed them together a little more, would I lose this with them? The unwelcome thought deflated my joy. We shouldn’t even be having sex, but I was already addicted to this new, physical part of our relationship.

  “What about Evil Dead?” Quentin asked.

  Which meant summoning ancient demons and depravity. Except Jeremy wasn’t going to allow it.

  “You win.” Jeremy said. “I won’t build porn around that.”

  Called it.

  Quentin studied him, eyes narrowed. “With all the possibilities…”

  “You can’t make a perfect movie better, even with demon dick,” Jeremy said.

  “Perfect movie.” Quentin’s voice was flat. “I can’t believe I let you touch my dick.” He took his time extracting himself from us.

  I grabbed his wrist and pulled him back into our mini puppy-pile. “Jeremy is a Bruce Campbell fanboy. Give him some leeway.”

  “You want porn? I’d let that man use and humiliate me.” Jeremy was completely serious.

  Quentin settled back in. “Watching that sounds far more appealing than the tentacles.”

  They were so good together.

  “Totally unrelated—as fun as this is—you should come with us tomorrow,” Jeremy said.

  Quentin nodded. “I’ve become rather fond of coming with you.”

  I snorted a laugh. “Not what he meant.”

  “You’re the word people—use your words. Be specific, or I’m going to go back to all the ways I want to see the two of you fucked.”

  Jeremy shook his head, but he was grinning. “My sisters and I volunteer once a month or so, and we’ve grown the group over the last few years. Sonya will be there. And Nigel. Tomorrow we’re helping build a shelter, and an extra set of hands always makes the day go faster.”

  “That sounds great. I’m in,” Quentin said.

  So far, my plans for getting the two of them to hook up hadn’t gone like I expected, but this was at least as good.

  Someone knocked on the front door then rang the bell. Weird. I never got unannounced visitors.

  “I’ll get it.” Quentin successfully untangled himself from us this time. He pulled on his sweats and looked around the room. “I’ll tell them they have the wrong house, and we can get back to coming together. Where the fuck is my shirt?” He grabbed a blanket off the back of a chair and draped it around his shoulders like a cape. “Don’t go anywhere.”

  “Do you think your shower will fit three people?” Jeremy asked as Quentin strolled away.

  I loved the motivation behind the suggestion. “Probably not. Besides, Art would remind you that shower sex is highly impractical.”

  “That’s the fun in it.” Jeremy grabbed his jeans and yanked them on, and then his shirt. He tossed me my clothes.

  I didn’t want to get dressed, but it was more practical than wandering around the house naked. I wasn’t that comfortable with these two. “What do you think is taking him so long?”

  Jeremy shrugged.

  We padded toward the front door. As we neared the entryway, I heard a man’s voice I didn’t recognize say, “Please, just hear me out.”

  I turned the corner in time to see Quentin swing the door shut in the man’s face without a reply.

  “Who was that?” I asked.

  Quentin didn’t turn around. “My ex-husband.”

  14

  Quentin

  My ex-husband was standing on the front porch, all but begging me to talk to him.

  The man who bankrupted me. Destroyed my livelihood. Made it impossible for me to work in this city doing something I excelled at.

  The man who broke my heart.

  How was I supposed to react to his being here?

  What I wanted to do was open the door again and deck him. Right cross to the jaw should bring him down hard. But then Sonya would have to deal with an unconscious man on her property, and regardless of my personal feelings, it was technically assault.